There is a moment before every trip into the outdoors when the weather forecast is consulted, for better or worse.

In this case, the team at Exped USA flew to Zurich for a series of meetings and we had planned to go backcountry skiing in the Alps over the weekend with our friends in the Zurich office. When the forecast called for rain in the mountains, some clear-headed thinkers asked the obvious question: should we call this thing off? Our friend Renato asked and the answer he got from Exped owner Andi Brun was, we're sure, not what he wanted to hear. "No, these guys like to go no matter what the weather. We do it!"

After hearing about his conversation after the trip, we wondered what gave Andi the idea that we resembled, in any way, some kind of hard-core adventurers. This remains a mystery, but as is often the case, the trip turned out fine. We did, for sure, ski in the pouring rain on the first day and at no time did we consider the snow skiable, but we had fun spending time in the outdoors with our co-workers across the Atlantic. Next time we're certain that the forecast will read "cold temperatures and 20cm of new, dry powder everywhere and low avalanche danger across the Alps." Until then, we will tell stories about our epic weekend in the slush.